Disposable absorbent articles such as diaper, training pants, sanitary napkins, pantiliners, and adult incontinence articles are commonly used to absorb and contain body exudates. Such articles are intended to prevent body exudates from soiling, wetting, or otherwise contaminating clothing or other articles, such as bedding, that may come into contact with the absorbent article. However, absorbent articles are still prone to failure. A common point of failure is when body exudates escape the boundaries of the article as a result of leakage from gaps between the article and the wearer's skin or from seepage through the material that makes up the absorbent article. The latter instance is often caused by the inability of the materials to serve as an effective barrier to such bodily fluids. For example, with sufficient pressure or loading, urine may penetrate through the materials that serve as a barrier, such as a leg cuff. Additionally, loose fecal matter that is not easily absorbed by the absorbent article tends to remain on top of the article's liquid receiving member. During the course of wear, fecal matter may spread over the liquid receiving member and may eventual leak from gaps between the article and the wearer or seep through barrier material.
Contemporary absorbent articles generally have a topsheet, a backsheet, an absorbent core, a barrier cuff, and a gasketing cuff. Other additional features such as barriers, pockets, spacers, transverse barriers, apertured topsheets and the like have been used to isolate, immobilize, or confine body exudates. While many attempts have been made at improving the barrier characteristics of an absorbent article, absorbent article design generally involves a balancing of factors. As a result, improved barrier characteristics are often countered with some undesirable characteristic. For example, an absorbent article can be made virtually liquid impervious through the use of polymeric films, but such films are also generally vapor and air impermeable. Although the article has aggressive barrier properties, the absorbent article may also occlude the skin of the wearer, which may result in diaper rash. The use of nonwoven materials is common in absorbent articles since they provide vapor and air impermeability, but nonwovens are subject to seepage given the appropriate conditions.
One way to improve the liquid retention capability of nonwovens is by increasing the basis weight. Nonwovens with higher basis weights generally have improved liquid impermeability. Another way to improve the liquid retention capability of nonwoven is through the use of nonwoven laminates. Multilayer nonwoven construction using continuous filaments (e.g., spunbond filaments) and fine fibers (e.g., meltblown fibers and nanofibers) is well known in the art. A common multilayer nonwoven construction is a tri-laminate spunbond-meltblown-spunbond (SMS) material. The meltblown layer exhibits liquid impermeability but lacks abrasion resistance and strength. The spunbonded layers are provided to impart needed abrasion resistance and strength to the laminate. While SMS materials provide a degree of liquid impermeability and maintain some vapor permeability, each layer of the SMS material may require a minimum basis weight in order to provide the layer's requisite characteristics. Increased basis weight is generally an undesirable characteristic in disposable absorbent articles. Increased basis weight can result in undesirable stiffness of the material, increased cost of material manufacture, and increased disposal volume.
Accordingly, it would be desirable to provide an absorbent article having a light-weight nonwoven material with improved barrier properties. Furthermore, it would be advantageous to provide an economical disposable article having a light-weight nonwoven material with the ability to minimize the negative effects of feces or other viscous bodily waste on the wearer or the caregiver. It would also be advantageous to provide an article which is designed to chemically or physically interact with materials making up the article and in order to reduce the amount of leakage and/or seepage that may occur.